


Adventures in Coparenting

by Illeana Starbright (SunlightOnTheWater)



Category: Alex Rider - Anthony Horowitz
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Ian Rider Lives, Ian Rider is Doing Doing His Best, Like MAJOR Canon Divergence, Parental Yassen Gregorovitch
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-03
Updated: 2021-01-24
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:53:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 10,604
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25689895
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SunlightOnTheWater/pseuds/Illeana%20Starbright
Summary: Alex is six when Ian comes home bloody and bruised and grim to accept the resignation of another harried housekeeper. He's fourteen when the police show up at three in the morning to tell him Ian is dead. He's fourteen when an internationally wanted assassin shows up on his doorstep with his uncle's will to turn everything he thinks he knows about Ian on its head. Everything after that should seem significantly less surprising. It really isn't.In which Alan Blunt plays his hand far too early, Ian Rider makes a secret contingency plan, Yassen Gregorovitch gets strong armed into parenting Hunter's son, and Alex just wants his life to make sense again.
Relationships: Alex Rider & Ian Rider, Alex Rider & Jack Starbright, Yassen Gregorovich & Alex Rider, Yassen Gregorovich & Ian Rider
Comments: 39
Kudos: 288





	1. Three AM Phone Calls

**1**

**Three AM Phone Calls**

* * *

_Alex is six when Ian comes home bloody and bruised and grim to accept the resignation of another harried housekeeper who snapped that she hadn't been hired to babysit. Ian had barely seemed to notice her ire in the same way he doesn't notice Alex now. His expression is distant and worried as he stares blankly into his tea while Alex picks at his food. Blood is seeping through the bandage wrapped around his arm, but Alex can't bring himself to mention it, not when there's something dark and almost foreboding about Ian like this, a certain lethality that Alex has never really noticed before. Instead the boy silently finishes his dinner as Ian's tea grows steadily colder. The clock on the wall ticking down the seconds provides an uneasy soundtrack to their otherwise silently meal._

_Alex finishes his last bite with no small amount of relief and is just pushing his chair back to leave the table with Ian abruptly fixes him with a piercing stare. The boy freezes, heart suddenly hammering in his chest. "Alex, I need you to listen to me very carefully, okay?" Ian says and Alex tentatively nods. "If something happens to me, I've left your guardianship in the hands of a friend of your father's, but certain people might try to prevent that. If I ever can't come home to you-" He is cut off abruptly by Alex making a startled noise and tumbling out of his chair to lurch around the table and tackle Ian in a hug. Ian winces as if Alex's hug hurts, but immediately hugs back. Ian is the only family Alex has ever really known, and the thought of something happening to him on one of his business trips or at the bank that could kill him hurts terribly to consider._

_"I'm sorry, Alex," Ian says into the boy's hair as he holds him close. "I wish I didn't have to say this, but it's too important not to bring up." Alex sniffles into the expensive fabric of one of Ian's dress shirts and his uncle squeezes him tighter. "I'm going to give you a phone number to memorize, and once you do we'll destroy the paper it's written on. If you ever are told that I'm dead, I need you to promise you'll call the number, okay?" Ian waits for Alex's shaky nod, the boy's head still pressed against his stomach, before he continues. "It will go to voicemail, but that's fine. Say you're leaving a message for Yasha. Tell him I'm gone and to bring the paperwork I gave him in Geneva. He might not spit on me if I was on fire, but he'd tear the world apart for you."_

_"But I don't want him," Alex insists in a watery voice, rearing back silently to stare stubbornly up at Ian. "I want you!"_

_"And I want to stay with you Alex, but I know better than to just assume that everything always works out the way we want it to." Alex makes an angry-sad noise of protest and buries his head back against Ian's stomach, getting his hair ruffled gently for his trouble. "I promise that if there is absolutely any way for me to come back for you. I will, okay?"_

_"Pinky promise?" Alex demands, tilting his head back again so he can meet Ian's gaze. His uncle nods solemnly and links his pinky with Alex's outstretched one._

_"Pinky promise."_

_Eight years later Alex will wake up at three in the morning to the sound of the doorbell and know, in that moment, that something has gone terribly wrong. He will listen, heart in his throat, as the police officers tell Jack something he's never wanted to hear. Then, when they've gone, he will creep downstairs and let her pull him into a tight hug as she tells him that Ian is dead. He will go numb sometime during the short conversation and his fingers will tremble uncontrollable as he clings to Jack. Then he will abruptly pull away from her and stumble towards the kitchen, the roaring wind between his ears louder than her worried questions as he pulls the phone down and dials a number from memory. It will ring exactly twice before going to a generic voicemail that rattles off the number he's just called in a robotic voice before instructing him to leave a message._

_"This is Alex Rider calling for Yasha," Alex will say, voice trembling a little over the next part. "Ian's dead." His legs will shake and he will feel, for a moment, like he's going to pass out or vomit. "He told me a long time ago to call you if that happened and tell you to bring the paperwork he gave you in Geneva." Then Alex will need three attempts to hang up the phone from how badly he is trembling. He will sink to the floor, legs refusing to hold him up any longer, and he will start to sob._

_Miles and miles away in Morocco, Yassen Gregorovitch will check a certain voicemail as he does every night. On this particular one, he will hear a message he has been expecting and dreading for eight years. He will gather his things and assassinate his target with far less observation than he usually prefers. Then he will pack up his things and board a train heading for London._

* * *

Ian's head felt muzzy and overfull and whatever they'd put him on had him high enough that he almost couldn't feel his ribs protesting or the throb of his aching head. Days were quickly beginning to blur together and he no longer had any idea if it was day or night. He wondered, almost absently, if Blunt had declared him dead yet or if the man would at least do his due diligence and check to make sure Ian didn't need retrieved. He seriously doubted his boss's good will towards him, especially after he'd told Blunt to go screw himself if he thought Ian was letting his nephew get wrapped up in anything to do with MI6. At least Gregorovitch would make sure Blunt died a horribly slow death before he managed to get his grubby little hands on John's son. A part of Ian was viciously glad for that. Blunt was the reason John had gotten pulled into the crusade against Scorpia, and his inability to protect his best agent when the job was done had cost Alex his parents. Ian loved his country, but what Blunt had tried to do after that had cost the man Ian's loyalty.

MI6 had tried to forge a will after John and Helen died, a will that didn't leave Ian with custody of his infant nephew. He'd come back from a mission and gone directly into battle with a copy of the real one, injuries be damned. Christina had been waiting for him at the airport and he'd let her drive his bruised and battered self to the courthouse without argument, mind roaring with barely suppressed fury. All he remembered from the drive, years later, was the pristine bun Christina's flaxen hair had been pulled into, even on her day off, and the dark, grim slash of her bright red lipstick as she drove, knuckles white from how tightly she'd gripped the wheel. She and Helen had been good friends, and the fact that MI6 was planning to raise Helen's son as a child operative had left her seething just as much as Ian had.

When Ian had emerged triumphantly from the courthouse hours later with a sleeping Alex cradled carefully against one shoulder, he'd been greeted by his closest coworkers, the ones who weren't currently on active missions, with balloons and sparse handfuls of confetti as they offered their relieved congratulations. Christina had gently squeezed his arm while Felix shouted, "Congratulations! You're a dad," loud enough to rouse an unhappy Alex from his well deserved nap. Instead of a small May wedding with a beautiful woman, Ian had gotten a son and he hadn't regretted it.

Alex was incredibly, clever and sweet and so eager to learn new things as he grew. It had only taken Ian one glimpse of Alan Blunt's unnatural interest in the boy for him to start working on a contingency plan. That was why he'd gone to Geneva with a brand new briefcase that Christina had bought him as a joke after the first time he'd been forced to feed Alex the banker line instead of telling the boy the dangerous truth about what he did. There was only one person Ian trusted to just pick up Alex and run from MI6, and do it successfully while toting around a child, if something happened to him. That was why he'd done the work and spent the long, late night hours tracking down Yassen Gregorovitch.

In the end it was Christina who had handed over the final piece of information like it was nothing, still so dedicated and genuinely kind to him in all the ways he didn't deserve six years later. She'd let Ian walk off into the night without blinking and hadn't told a soul where he was headed, letting him forge his own path uninterrupted. The hardest part of his self appointed task had been getting close to Gregorovitch without the assassin killing him from the other end of a sniper's scope. After that, it had only been a matter of pressing the right buttons, or really what few emotional buttons lingered, to leverage the assassin's lingering emotional response to Hunter. Alex's future safety had been secured and Ian had taken the flight back to brace himself for one of the most emotionally devastating conversations with his nephew that he would ever have.

Ian loved his country, but he loved Alex more and was willing to do whatever it took to keep his nephew safe. Even if that meant consorting with an internationally wanted terrorist to keep the boy from becoming MI6's little toy soldier. The door to his cell swung open and Ian braced himself for the next round of interrogation, very deliberately clearing his mind of any thoughts but getting home to Alex. He'd made the boy a promise eight years ago, pinky linked around the boy's much smaller one, and he intended to keep it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have a bunch of chunks of this story scribbled down in a notebook and am now in the process of slowly fitting them together, so I make no promises on how quickly this story will be updated. Also it has been ages since I've read these books and am just now in the process of rereading them, so apologies in advance for any inconsistencies in characterization. I am just going to chalk up any other inconsistencies to canon storylines as AU territory. Happy Reading!


	2. An Auspicious Arrival

**2**

**An Auspicious Arrival**

* * *

The house in Chelsea was modestly upper middle class with none of the flashy additions that came with the desire to show off newly gained wealth. Neither John nor Ian Rider had approved of recklessly flaunting their wealth any more than they had desired to show their hand too early on a mission, instead choosing to keep their cards close to their chest. Yassen Gregorovitch had stepped out of the cab two streets away from this house and walked. He was wearing a long grey coat with the collar pulled up against the back of his neck and carrying a dark brown briefcase, its pristine silver lock flashing in the sunlight. Inside the briefcase was an ID and passport, both listing him as Yasha Petrov, whose family had immigrated to Britain four generations ago, as well as the notarized last will and testament of Ian Rider, which had been updated and secretly sent to him just nine months before. It would be recent enough to invalidate anything that Alan Blunt might try to forge or modify. The briefcase itself had been thrust upon him by Ian Rider after the spy had tracked him down to a hotel in Geneva, ruthlessly leveraging his lingering affection for Hunter in order to secure his nephew's future safety. Yassen had found himself reluctantly impressed with the other man's tactics and had, in a momentary fit of insanity, agreed.

Yassen climbed the steps and rapped twice on the door, waiting patiently for someone to answer. He could have gone about this a different way, but he had no doubt that MI6 was intently watching the Rider home, which would complicate matters. Furthermore, suddenly appearing in the house with no warning would give Alex Rider little reason to trust him. Yassen needed the boy unwilling to sell him out to MI6 if he was going to keep Alex out of their clutches. There was some soft, lethargic shuffling approaching the door and then it swung open to reveal a very young version of Hunter. His eyes were red rimmed from crying and his shoulders were slumped. The sweater he was wearing was far too large for him, probably one of Ian's taken for some measure of comfort. There was a long moment of silence as the boy stared blankly at him.

"Alex, my name is Yasha," Yassen said finally, his old name feeling strange and wrong on his tongue. "May I come in?" The boy's eyes flickered briefly with curiosity before it faded back to apathy and he stepped aside, swinging the door open wider. Yassen stepped inside, allowing Alex to pull the door shut behind him, and was instantly swallowed by long shadows. The curtains had all been drawn, leaving the interior of the house with a dark and gloomy atmosphere. The only hint of brightness was the light spilling out from the kitchen as someone rattled pots and pans. Otherwise, the house felt like a well decorated tomb.

"Alex, honey, who was that?" a woman's voice asked, and a moment later a young red head, likely in her mid to early twenties, stepped out of the kitchen. Her accent was wrong for her to be a British citizen. It settled her somewhere in the United States instead.

"Call me Yasha," Yassen said when it became obvious that Alex wasn't going to speak to her any more than the boy had spoken to him. He watched sudden realization dawn on her face, followed swiftly by a hint of wary suspicion. She didn't know him anymore than Alex did, and she cared for the boy enough to be uncertain about whether she should trust Yassen with him. It was an admirable sentiment.

"The same one Ian told Alex to call if this happened?" she questioned, something almost like disapproval slipping into her tone. Something about the way Ian had approached this had clearly upset her.

"Yes." Yassen turned back to Alex, who was staring blankly down at the floor, the fingers of one hand twisting almost anxiously in the hem of the sweater. "We have important matters to discuss."

"The funeral has already been planned," the red head said, voice going sharp and rather defensive as she brushed by Yassen to slip a comforting arm around Alex's shoulders. The boy leaned into her, tired eyes slipping closed for a brief moment before they snapped back open again. "Some people from Ian's work set it all up."

"I'm sure," Yassen replied tonelessly. He had no doubt that Alan Blunt had seized the opportunity handed to him, already preparing to manipulate Alex's life to his liking, just as Ian had feared. Hunter's brother had been reckless almost to the point of stupidity at times, but he was far from stupid and Blunt had a reputation even in the criminal underworld for being unnecessarily ruthless to achieve his own ends. Yassen would be looking into Ian's death, if for no other reason than to have another card to play when Blunt attempted to take Alex. "That is not what I was speaking about. What did your uncle tell you about his job?" He directed the question to Alex who finally glanced up from the floor, head tilting like a curious puppy as he took Yassen in.

"He worked for some bank," Alex told him after a moment. "Royal and General, I think."

"So nothing then." Yassen ruthlessly suppressed his brief flash of frustration at the other man's choices. He understood the desire to keep Alex as far from MI6's machinations as possible, but not telling the boy the truth had left him vulnerable to their manipulations after Ian's death. "Ian Rider was a spy," he informed Alex bluntly, watching surprise dart across the boy's face, quickly followed a dawning understanding. "Royal and General is a front for MI6's main base of operations."

"What?" the red head said, voice going high and startled, but Alex was staring intently through Yassen, as if tallying the sum of different instances and coming up with no other plausible answer.

"He kept it a secret to protect you, but there is no safety in ignorance now." Yassen watched the boy slump more heavily into the red head beside him, the last of his energy sapped by the revelation. "Get some rest. We'll finish this conversation once you've slept."

Alex opened his mouth to protest but was interrupted by the red head. "He's right Alex. Get some sleep. I'll make sure he's still here when you wake up."

"Mmmkay," Alex slurred out tiredly. "Thanks Jack."

They both watched as the boy stumbled up the stairs with surprising grace. Then the woman, Jack, turned in an attempt to stare Yassen down. "You and I need to talk."

* * *

Felix stepped out of the airport feeling like every inch of his body ached. His head was pounding with the lingering remnants of a mild dehydration headache and he had a burning desire to never go back to Haiti again. Ever. Christina was waiting for him in the pickup lane as promised, her soft blonde hair pulled back in its usual strict bun. The only concession she had towards it being her day off were the blue jeans she was wearing with her delicate flower print blouse. Their eyes met through the crowd of people rushing to get back home and she ducked quickly into her powder blue sedan, emerging a moment later with a bottle of water that she handed over when he got close enough. "Thanks," he mumbled, voice rough and a little bit dry from lack of sleep and recycled airplane air, unscrewing the cap and downing half the bottle in one go as he ducked into the passenger side of the vehicle. Christina nodded in acknowledgement and settled in the driver's seat, flipping the radio off as she carefully pulled away from the curb and headed out of the airport. Felix focused on finishing up the bottled water, doing his best to block out everything he'd just gone through. The only truly satisfying part of the mission had been blowing up a warehouse, but even that had left him feeling profoundly unsatisfied.

Christina was tense, shoulders tight and lips pulled into a thin line instead of her usual absent smile. He had missed something while he was gone, something big. Felix finished his water and jammed the empty plastic bottle into a cup holder. "So, what did I miss?" he asked, skipping over any usual pleasantries. If Christina was this visibly tense, then something had gone terribly wrong.

"Blunt's labeled Ian KIA." Christina's voice was purposefully empty, never a good sign. Felix frowned, trying to remember what the other agent's last mission had been.

"Wasn't he information gathering in Myanmar?"

"It was supposed to be a low risk operation," Christina confirmed.

"Then how the fuck is he dead?" Ian Rider was the best of the best in MI6, the cream of the crop, pyromaniac tendencies aside. An intel gathering mission should have been a piece of cake for someone like him.

"He missed extraction and then two emergency check ins."

"And retrieval confirmed the loss, or as good as?"

"There was no retrieval." Felix broke into a string of curses, switching to Spanish and then French when he ran out of English ones. Christina casually rolled up the car windows so the family with little children in the vehicle next to them at the stoplight couldn't hear him.

"What about Alex?" he asked when he regained control of his temper. He had no doubt she knew. Christina and John Crawley went out for drinks every other Friday night, and Crawley was undoubtedly the best connected agent to the MI6 gossip ring.

"MI6 is intending to get custody of him," Christina said, voice taut with silent fury. Felix broke out his extensive library of swears again as she turned the corner and headed for Royal and General. When she stopped in front of the bank, she turned to stare him down, pale blue eyes cold and serious. "Not a word of this leaves this car, understand? Not yet."

"Cross my heart and hope to die," Felix responded, even going as far as to actually cross his heart.

Christina nodded and waited until he'd started up the stairs before rolling down the window and calling, "Have fun with your debrief." Felix flipped her off without looking and heard her pull away laughing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have no idea if I did Yassen justice. Hopefully he's at least passable. Also we see so few MI6 agents with Alex as our narrator (another way MI6 is being shady as heck around him) so there will be a handful of reoccurring OCs staring as Ian's coworkers. Happy Reading!


	3. Sunshine at a Funeral

**3**

**Sunshine at a Funeral**

* * *

It seemed wrong that the sun was out and shining for Ian's funeral. The world should have been as grey and dull as it felt to Alex, with thick clouds hanging low in the sky and threatening rain. He stepped out of the passenger side of the car, staring blankly ahead as Jack circled around the front of the vehicle to rest a comforting hand against his shoulder. A group of mourners, people Alex had never seen before in his life, were gathered around the open grave in awkward looking clusters. All of them were dressed in suits nearly identical to the one Alex had noticed Mr. Crawley wearing when the man had come to pick he and Jack up. Maybe if he hadn't known the truth, Alex would have assumed that they'd just all purchased their mourning clothes at the same shop, but with his newfound knowledge he assumed they were all MI6 agents. He felt a little uncomfortable taking Yasha's word for it, but he didn't think the man had a reason to lie to him about something like that.

Another vehicle pulled up as Mr. Crawley led Alex and Jack towards the grave, and a grey man in yet another identical suit stepped out of it, his pale worm like lips pulled into a flat, bland line. "That's Alan Blunt, the bank manager," Mr. Crawley helpfully informed Alex, who allowed Jack to guide him over to stand near the casket while he worked to translate Blunt's fake job title into a probable real one. Anger unspooled itself in Alex's chest as a priest he'd never met prattled his way through a largely bland and generic sounding eulogy. Blunt was the one responsible for sending Ian to his death, without even the respect to tell the boy the truth about what Ian was afterwards, and the man had the gall to stand there at Ian's funeral like it meant nothing. Alex squeezed Jack's hand tightly in barely suppressed fury. Her gentle squeeze back got him through the service without exploding into largely aimless rage. He understood logically that it wasn't Blunt's fault that Ian hadn't made it back from his mission, but the hurt and grief were still too fresh for him to even attempt to be rational.

The service ended and Alex turned away from the closed casket, feeling sick. He hadn't been given a chance to see Ian's body one last time, and he found himself squeezing his eyes shut as he tried to picture the last time he'd seen his uncle. Ian had been almost at the door when Alex had come down for breakfast, but he'd circled back to give the boy a quick hug and ruffle his hair before promising to come home as soon as possible. He'd been wearing one of his usual crisp, black suits, the same kind of suits everyone else was wearing at his funeral. Alex wondered how long it would take for him to forget the feeling of his uncle's hugs, the smell of his cologne, or the sound of his voice. He wondered if, sooner or later, he'd eventually forget Ian almost entirely.

Alex trudged after Mr. Crawley towards the vehicle they'd arrived in, Jack's hand still steady on his shoulder, feeling like a hollowed out shell. The rage had deflated like a leaky water balloon, leaving only a deep sadness behind. All he wanted to do was curl up in his bed wearing another one of Ian's sweaters and pretend this was all a bad dream. That was when it happened. The driver of Alan Blunt's car leaned just a little too far forward to open the man's door and, as he did so, his unbuttoned suit jacket slid back to briefly reveal a gun. The driver hastened to adjust the jacket as soon as he noticed, but Alex had already seen it. Maybe in another life, the boy would have assumed that the whole thing was an accident. In this one, Alex didn't have that luxury. The driver was the only one who hadn't buttoned his jacket, and if he was driving around the head of MI6 he had to be a consummate professional. Showing Alex the weapon had been intentional, but why?

Alex felt his mouth go dry and his stomach twist uncomfortably with sudden dread. He jerked his gaze away from Blunt and the driver, feeling suddenly dizzy, and caught sight of a deep blue SUV pulling up to the edge of the graveyard. One of the windows rolled down, and the boy caught sight of Yasha in the driver's seat. The man had declined to come to Ian's funeral, muttering something under his breath about Rider's holding long grudges, so Alex had expected to have to ride back to the house with Mr. Crawley. He felt a sudden rush of relief that he wouldn't be subjected to another minute with one of MI6's men as he picked up the pace, hurrying for the vehicle with Jack in tow. As he opened the back door and climbed inside, he could feel eyes boring a hole in his back. Just before Jack pulled the door shut behind her, the boy turned to see Alan Blunt and Mr. Crawley both staring his direction. Blunt's aloof expression had been worn away by sudden rage, but Mr. Crawley had gone entirely pale. Then Jack had slammed the door behind her and Yasha was driving out of the graveyard and toward the house.

Yasha didn't ask how the funeral was, and Alex was glad as he twisted and turned the last few moments of the funeral around in his head. He was almost entirely certain of his initial assessment of the unexpected turn of events. Alan Blunt had wanted him to see the gun, but the why was a complete mystery. It probably tied in with the reason Ian had sat Alex down all those years ago and told him exactly what to do if he died, but Alex didn't know what it all meant. He wondered, hesitatingly, if he should mention it to Yasha. The vehicle pulled into the drive before he had really made his mind out. Jack slid out of he seat and headed into the house, probably to fix him some hot chocolate in an attempt to make him feel better, but Alex didn't move, frozen with unexpected indecision. When he finally looked up from the back of the seat in front of him, he found himself meeting Yasha's cool blue eyes in the rearview mirror.

"Something happened at the funeral." Yasha didn't say it like it was a question. Whatever he saw in Alex's expression told him it was a fact.

"Yes." Alex swallowed, hesitated, and then nodded to himself. What did he have to lose? "Ian's boss was there. At the end of the funeral, he made sure I'd see his driver's gun." Yasha nodded and Alex felt as if a sudden weight had been lifted off his shoulders. Whatever was happening was Yasha's problem now, and the boy had no doubt that he'd take care of it.

"I have to make some inquiries," Yasha said as Alex swung open his door to slide out of the SUV. "I will return by seven thirty."

"Okay," Alex agreed and slammed the door, heading for the house. Maybe he'd grab one of Ian's sweaters and see if Jack was up for watching a movie. Getting immersed in another world sounded infinitely more appealing than continuing to deal with whatever horribleness his life had descended to in the last few days. He'd face reality again tomorrow.

* * *

John Crawley had a headache. A horrible headache that made his temples pulse and turned every bit of bright sunlight that could reach him into a piercing spear of agony. He'd already swallowed down close to six ibprofin and four advil, none of which had made a dent in it, not that he was particularly surprised. After all, this was an Ian Rider headache. Brilliant as he had been, Ian Rider had also been somewhat of a bureaucratic nightmare to deal with whether it was catching buildings full of evidence on fire to serve as a distraction or suddenly going dark only to emerge four days later with various injuries and dragging along a traumatized informant. This particular burgeoning nightmare had his chaos loving fingerprints all over it.

Crawley's headache had started out when Alan Blunt had emailed him at 5:45 AM to inform him that he would be expected to escort Alex Rider and Jackalinne "Jack" Starbright to Ian RIder's funeral. The very beginning beats of a steady headache had begun drumming away in his skull as he'd dressed and cleared his car of any possible evidence of his job. He'd arrived at the Rider household to pick up a morose looking Alex and a very concerned Jack Starbright with a full blown headache chipping away at his will to live. He'd suffered through the short, trite funeral that Blunt had set up for their top agent, MI6's head apparently missing all the unhappy whispers that had sprung up around the suddenness of the decision to label Rider as deceased, and had been relieved when Alex didn't seem inclined to linger at the grave site. What had followed was practically hand designed to keep him from getting any much needed rest for the next month.

First, Blunt had apparently decided to attempt to bait Ian's nephew into trying to figure out what was going on by getting his driver to "unintentionally" show Alex his gun. Crawley had known Tom Hawkins for years, and knew the man was far too professional to ever leave his jacket unbuttoned with a civilian present. Then internationally wanted assassin Yassen Gregorovitch had shown up, apparently to pick up Alex and Miss Starbright. Crawley had watched the blue SUV, likely a rental or stolen, pull away from the graveyard feeling more than a little faint.

Blunt, unsurprisingly, had been apoplectic back at the office, cheeks flushed as he ranted to Jones about the indignity of having one of MI6's best prospects for the Sayle case living in the pocket of a contract killer like Gregorovitch to Jones, yelling at Crawley to find out what was going on and to track Gregorovitch down, and then swearing profusely at the ceiling before starting the cycle again. Crawley had crept out of the office after the fourth time through the cycle when Tulip Jones had cracked one of her peppermints sharply between her teeth like she was picturing doing the same to Blunt's head. Back at his desk, he had started popping headache relievers like they were candy and silently lamenting the fact that his migraine medication had accidentally been left at home. He kept trying to remember to see about getting a small bottle to keep at the office, but since his sister Louise had moved two hours away, there was never anyone around to pester him in his few off hours to take care of little things like that.

He was practically drowning in his own ineffectual misery when Christina Clarke settled a fresh bottle of water next to him before softly lifting his keys that she'd apparently pick-pocketed from him and tapping softly out of the office. She returned about a half an hour later, when Crawley was halfway through the water, to hand over his pills and keys before heading back to her own office where she was dutifully finishing up her last mission report. Half an hour later when the worst of his symptoms began fading away, he started in on finding Gregorovitch, trying very hard not to think about how Blunt had called Alex their best prospect for finding out whatever Herod Sayle was hiding. If Ian Rider was still alive, he'd murder them all just for letting the boss even think about using his nephew that way. Personally, Crawley hoped Rider did come crawling out of the woodwork. It seemed that it was past time for someone to cut Alan Blunt down to size.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am aware that we never actually get Jack's real first name, but it wouldn't make any sense for MI6 not to know it, especially since they looked into her visa in the series, so I made one up for her. Honestly, it'll probably never pop up again.
> 
> Also in the span of about a week I've moved and started a new job, so this chapter took far longer to get put together than I expected it to. I'm hoping to get the next one pieced together much sooner, especially since I think I already have everything for it written and just have to tweak it to get it to fit right.
> 
> And yes, John Crawley and Christina Clarke have absolutely spent their entire lives knowing everything about everything from opposite ends of the spectrum (think Harriet the Spy on one end and Gretchen Wieners on the other)


	4. Lingering Suspicions

**4**

**Lingering Suspicions**

* * *

Lanette Peacock unlocked the door of her bar just as the sun began setting behind the surrounding buildings, flipping on the lights as she stepped inside. The cook, bartenders, and bouncer wouldn’t be here for another couple of hours, but Lainie would have customers of a different sort than her bar patrons. Lainie had grown up in a house with a father who drank far too much and beat his family when he got truly plastered. Her mother had stayed with him because of what he could provide; expensive clothes, flashy jewelry, and all the designer drugs she could ever want. Alfred Peacock, despite his own vices, had been a capable information broker, which was absolutely the only thing she admired him for. He had wielded his knowledge as effectively as any deadly weapon and his efforts had provided their mother every expensive vice she desired. There was something intoxicating about having that sort of power, so dealing in secret information was the one piece of her childhood she'd been unable to leave behind. Everything else she'd whole-heartedly abandoned the moment she turned eighteen.

Lainie opened her bar two hours early every day for this particular type of clientele, and those two hours earned her far more income than her modestly successful drinking establishment. The money would keep her living comfortably long after she retired, and since she had no interest in having children of her own, the remained would go to her young niece and nephew after her death. Cathy and Michael were sweet, smart children and deserved far more than their druggie mother and dodgy father would ever be able to give them. Lainie hummed as she settled her purse on the floor in its hidden nook behind the bar, unsurprised when the bell on the door chimed behind her. There was always someone in London looking for information, whether it was blackmail on a crooked politician or the truth about whether or not their spouse was cheating on them. She turned to greet her first client of the evening and felt her heart skip a beat as she watched Yassen Gregorovitch silently lock the door behind him. Cossack was a legend, and a very deadly one at that. Having Scorpia's best show up unexpectedly in her bar was not a promising sign for how the rest of her evening would go.

"Well this is certainly unprecedented," Lainie said dryly, pleased when her voice came out far more calmly than she felt. If Scorpia had decided to eliminate her, then nothing she could do would prevent that. Trying to stop Gregorovitch had long ago been proven a futile effort. "What can I do for you?"

"I'm looking for information on Ian Rider's last mission," was the cool response and Lainie felt her eyebrows rise towards her hairline.

"That's a tall order. MI6 is incredibly protective of their mission files and retracing an agent's steps takes time, especially without knowing his mission parameters." She hesitated a moment, part of her desperately wanting to turn the job down. Anything to do with MI6 agents and Scorpia had the potential to be incredibly dangerous, and it would be safer for her long term health if she politely declined, but she hadn't gotten anywhere in life by being a coward. She pulled in a steadying breath before diving into the situation head first. "Scorpia would be better equipped to handle this sort of request than I am." It was common knowledge in the criminal underground that Scorpia had at least one mole in every major intelligence agency in the world, and the likelihood that they had several inside MI6 was high, considering how often British intelligence attempted to thwart them.

"Scorpia is not involved in this," was Yassen's swift reply, and the look in his eyes could have melted steel.

"I want double my usual fee," Lainie negotiated, assuming that Gregorovitch had already gotten all the information he needed about her pricing and capabilities from others before he showed up. "I don't usually touch anything that MI6 has their sticky little fingers in. It's not good for business."

"For that amount, I want the information in two weeks."

"Done." That would be pushing things, but the quicker she wrapped this up, the quicker she could get Cossack far away from her bar. It was worth the risk of her not turning up anything for him at all.

"And if you don't deliver?"

"Then you don't pay," Lainie replied with an easy shrug. Her father had always demanded the money up front and kept it "for the trouble" even if he didn't dig anything up. That practice had gotten him killed. Never let it be said that Lainie hadn't learned from his mistakes. "But I always deliver." It was a point of personal pride for her that she'd always managed to dig up the right information for her clients, and there was no way she was going to let Scorpia's deadliest assassin break her streak.

"I'll return in two weeks," Yassen said in a tone that sounded more like a threat than a promise. Then he was gone, door clicking shut behind him. Lainie allowed herself to sink to the floor and shake with silently suppressed panic for exactly two minutes. Then she retrieved her phone from her purse as she rose and started dialing. She had so much work to do, and so little time to do it in. Best to get started now.

* * *

"Hey, Matty." The office was almost entirely empty when Emily Winters leaned around the corner of the cubicle. Her fiance, a broad shouldered red head who was growing a truly impressive beard, glanced up from his computer with a smile.

"What's up, Em?"

"Did we send a retrieval team after Ian?"

His brow furrowed in thought for a moment before he frowned and said, "No."

"So we got a body then, or some kind of definitive proof of death." Emily's expression was open and relaxed, but her shoulders tensed as she spoke.

"Not that I've heard." Ian Rider was MI6's top agent, and well liked within the office. The office would have been in an uproar had there been a body, with rumors flying every which way, the same as it always was with any gossip that involved Rider. MI6 may have been a professional intelligence agency, but that didn't mean it didn't have a thriving gossip machine. On the contrary, it meant that every rumor went around the building twice before the personnel member in question had even been able to submit their official report. Matthew Callaghan spun his chair around, giving his fiance his full attention. "What are you getting at?"

Emily's brown eyes scanned their surroundings for a moment before she casually leaned closer to him, expression intense. "Don't you find it the least bit suspicious that our boss labels Ian as KIA on a mission right after he denied MI6 the right to use his nephew on the Sayle operation, especially considering Ian's habit of missing check ins and then popped up two days later out of nowhere? And then, as the cherry on top of this whole garbage heap, Blunt just happens to pull a will out of nowhere that lists the Royal and General Bank as Alex Rider's legal guardians?"

"You think MI6 sent Ian on an unexpected extra mission right before he took over the Sayle operation and then left him for dead at the first opportunity so they could use his nephew," Matthew summarized in a barely there whisper.

"Not MI6 as a whole, and not necessarily even Jones, though she's ruthless enough for it," Emily replied grimly. "Blunt though? Absolutely." Matthew didn't even attempt to argue that point. Alan Blunt was ruthless, often times too much so, and Matthew could easily see his boss's cold nature taking advantage of a situation like this to get what he wanted.

"We'd need to find evidence that Ian is still alive before we can do anything."

"Then we start digging. If Ian is alive, then Alex deserves to get his uncle back, and there's no way in hell that I'm letting Blunt get away with something like this."

"And what do we do if we do find proof?" Matthew prodded, wanting to make sure his often impulsive fiance had thought this through.

"Then we take it to Jones. Blunt will be kept busy in the next couple of weeks with all the business surrounding Sayle, and with the unexpected little hiccup that Gregorovitch's presence is proving to be, so if she gives the okay for a retrieval attempt he won't be able to counter it in time to stop us."

"And if she doesn't okay it?" Matthew asked, realizing that sometime during the course of the conversation he had stopped assuming that Blunt was innocent.

"Then I'll go rogue if I have to. I love my country, but if Ian is alive then he and Alex deserve better than this."

"You mean we'll go rogue," Matthew corrected determinedly. "We have plenty of vacation days stacked up by now. We'll just say that we have some wedding planning to do and will be out of reach for a little bit." Emily beamed at him and leaned over to kiss him. When she pulled away he added, "Put dinner in the refrigerator for me please. I'll be home late." He had some research to do, and a limited window to do it in if he was going to have any chance of finding evidence that Ian might still be alive.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, I made everyone wait that long for a filler chapter. Sorry! I promise that we'll be back to more canon characters in the next chapter, and that I won't make you wait near as long for it. Happy Reading!


	5. Opening Gambit

**Five**

**Opening Gambit**

* * *

School had passed in a haze of exhaustion, punctuated with sudden, inexplicable bouts of crushing sadness. Alex hadn't slept well, mind twisting between the possible reasons why Alan Blunt would have wanted him to see the gun. The few hours of rest he had managed to snatch hadn't exactly been restful. Ian had died over and over again in his dreams, his mind fabricating a different horrible way to go out in each one. By the time his alarm had gone off, he'd been eager to get up and start moving despite his exhaustion.

Alex made his way down the front steps of Brooklands before he realized that Alan Blunt was waiting for him on the sidewalk. "Hello, Alex," Blunt said with what Alex suspected was supposed to be a friendly smile. "I was hoping we could talk."

"About what?" Alex asked, eyeing the man warily. He might be tired, but he wasn't stupid. Yasha had warned the boy that MI6 wouldn't approve of him having guardianship, though he hadn't explained why, and might try something to circumvent that.

"About your uncle's will," Blunt replied, apparently unbothered by Alex's barely leashed hostility. Then the man stepped aside and gestured towards the open car door behind him, like he was some kind of overdramatic Bond villain. "I can give you a ride back t your house and fill you in on all the details."

Alex hesitated a moment, but he had walked to school and didn't fancy the trek home this afternoon. He also didn't want to seriously antagonize a secret spy organization unless he had no other choice, at least not on only a couple hours of sleep. "Sure," he said dryly, making his way past Blunt and into the vehicle. This was probably a terrible idea, bu Alex didn't exactly have a better one.

Blunt shut the care door and made his way around to the other side, settling in the seat next to Alex. "Royal and General are the executors of your uncle's will," Blunt explained in a falsely sympathetic tone as the driver pulled away from the school. "Mr. Crawley will be in charge of making sure everything is carried out to Ian's exact specifications, but your uncle was such a loyal patron of ours that I thought it only right to tell you the details myself." Alex grit his teeth so hard they ached. He wanted to tell Blunt to cut the crap, but he knew he shouldn't give away the fact that he knew the bank was only a front for MI6. "Royal and General has been given custody of you, though of course Ms. Starbright may wish to stay on and keep an eye on your day to day needs. Unfortunately until the matters are settled, we will need to have you move into one of the apartments above the bank, just temporarily of course."

"No," Alex said, his heartbeat suddenly loud in his ears.

"I know this is difficult for you, Alexander," Blunt said, his tone slimy and self-assured. "You've went through a terrible tragedy at such a young age, and you are naturally resistant to any kind of change, but this is only a temporary matter. You can pack a page when we arrive at your house while I explain to Ms. Starbright what is going on and-"

"No," Alex said, with all the restraint that he did not possess. "I'm not going anywhere with you or your people. Besides, I think your will is a little outdated."

"And what, exactly, do you mean by that?" Blunt asked, gaze sharp and cold.

"A family friend arrived not long after Ian's death," Alex told the man as the car pulled into his drive and stopped. "A man named Yasha Petrov. He has the most recent version of Ian's will that names him as the guardian, so I won't be going anywhere with you."

Alex scrambled for the seatbelt, unbuckling it and flinging open the car door. His heart was beating like a drum, and felt like it was trying to crawl up his throat to escape. Alex was halfway out of the car when Blunt said, "Yasha Petrov doesn't exist."

"What?" Alex froze, glancing back at the man.

"Yasha Petrov doesn't exist," Blunt repeated, tone almost unbearably smug. "It is a false identity for a man named Yassen Gregorovitch. He is an internationally wanted assassin, and even if he wanted to keep you, no court would let him. It would be nothing short of reckless child endangerment." Alex's stomach rolled uncomfortable as he watched Blunt smile humorlessly at him. "You're going to have to come with us one way or another, Alex. Why not take the easy way?"

"I'll work for you when I'm dead," Alex spat, feeling painfully like he was moments away from throwing up or, worse yet, bursting into tears. He scrambled free of the car, slamming the door behind him, and fled into the house. He completely ignored Jack's cheery greeting, mind racing as he scrambled up the stairs to his room. He needed answers, fast, before the black hole that Ian's death had left behind sucked him in.

* * *

Alan Blunt was silently seething. Ian Rider's death, tragic as it might be for what little family he had left to mourn him, had created a unique opportunity. Blunt had learned a long time ago to take advantage of those opportunities when they presented themselves. The mission in Burma had not been meant to eliminate Agent Rider, the man was far to valuable to utilize such tactics on, even though he'd sharply refused MI6 the chance to use his nephew to deal with Herod Sayle. Rider had insisted that he could gather the information they needed, and MI6 had reluctantly agreed, but had needed him in Burma for a few days beforehand to handle a small terrorist cell. The mission had upgraded slightly when Rider had uncovered evidence that Scorpia had their filthy little hands in this particular pie, and they'd moved to pull their agent out to replace him with someone who could be posted their on a more long term basis. All attempts to contact Rider had quickly proved fruitless. Blunt had closed the mission and declared it a complete loss, feeling only a flicker of regret for the waste of resources. That was when he'd taken a glance at Rider's will.

Ian Rider had last updated his will two years ago, listing one Jack Starbright as his nephew's legal guardian in the even of his death. Blunt had seen the possibilities in that and decided to seize his chance. With Rider's death, they would need a new plan to deal with Sayle, and Blunt believed that the original plan would do. It would be easy enough to alter the will to list MI6 as young Alexander's legal guardian. Starbright's current visa was almost up, so they could always use her as leverage if Alex should choose to be uncooperative. Tulip might have some moral objection to using the boy, but her compunctions could easily be waylaid by the fact that lives were at stake.

Everything had been running smoothly, despite the worrying hiccup that Yassen Gregorovitch's unexpected appearance had been. Blunt had decided to approach Alex after school, to avoid the risk that he might find himself face to face with the assassin in a shadowy back room. He'd revealed their will and leveraged the fact that Starbright's visa was almost up when the boy tried to be stubborn. He'd also taken the time to hand deliver Gregorovitch's real identity to Alex and led the boy to the conclusion that an internationally wanted assassin couldn't possibly have custody of him. Alex had been upset and anxious, and had run off practically in tears. Blunt had anticipated Alex's arrival at Royal and General once he reassured himself of the truth. Instead a second will had emerged; one that named British citizen Yasha Petrov as Alex Rider's guardian.

MI6's lawyers had contested the will, naturally, with very little hope of getting it overturned. The will itself was under a year old, though no one in MI6 seemed to know when Ian had gotten it made, and the only major change was Alex's guardianship. Yasha Petrov was, of course, Yassen Gregorovitch, but the identity was incredibly well made. MI6 hadn't had time to pull together enough evidence to prove they were the same person. Blunt was furious but unsurprised that they had quickly lost their case. Alex Rider remained firmly out of their reach, and time was ticking down on release of Herod Sayle's Stormbreakers. Blunt needed something to work out in his favor, before his suspicions proved correct when it was already far too late to do anything about it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is probably the only chapter you will get this month, because its NaNoWriMo season and I am determined to finish my project. In the meantime, hope you enjoyed and happy reading!


	6. Two Steps Forward, One Step Back

**Six**

**Two Steps Forward, One Step Back**

* * *

His new guardian was an internationally wanted assassin. The knowledge had been buzzing in Alex's head like an angry nest of hornets ever since his own research basically confirmed what Blunt had told him. He'd really, really wanted Ian's former boss to be a liar, but it didn't look like he had been. Yassen Gregorovitch, an elite sniper wanted in more countries than Alex could accurately find on a map, looked an awful lot like Yasha Petrov in the few grainy surveillance photos buried deep on the web. Alex had regretted using the computer skills Ian had taught him to find out more. He'd come across some disturbing images showing him what, exactly, his new guardian was capable of. He had to make an immediate run to the toilet to vomit up his lunch after about the third one. He closed out of all the tabs when he'd finally stumbled back and curled up under the covers for the rest of the day.

Since then he'd been successfully avoiding Yasha-Yassen-Whoever he actually was. Alex was under no illusion that his success was due to his own skills. MI6 had "uncovered" some new "evidence" that had allowed them to contest Ian's will again, which meant that his new guardian had spent most of his time in court sitting next to a very expensive lawyer. The man returned to the house at just after five, which left Alex plenty of time to get home, eat a snack, do his homework, and generally hole up in his room for the rest of the evening. Jack was worried enough about him that, when she'd picked him up from school, she'd suggested they go get ice cream for supper. Alex hadn't protested, even though it was just past three in the afternoon and he'd have to have a thousand lucky clovers to be able to sneak past Yasha to hide out upstairs. Jack was probably the best part of his life right now, and there was no way he was going to make her worry more if he didn't have to.

That was how he'd ended up on a park bench eating ice cream and watching people hurry past, doing his best to laugh with Jack as she made increasingly wild guesses about where they were going. Alex knew she was still watching him worriedly from the corner of her eye while she continued to try and make him laugh, but he wasn't sure how to make her less worried. He tried to widen his smile, just a little, at her next joke, but it only made her look more concerned. If things kept going this way, she'd start prying into what was wrong, and there was no way he could tell her that Yasha was an assassin. Something would go horribly wrong and he'd end up going to Jack's funeral next.

His dark musing was interrupted by a thud, a splattering sound, and a sudden curse. Alex glanced to his left to see a dark haired woman apologizing profusely to a blonde, whose crisp white shirt had become home to her undoubtedly expensive iced coffee. "I'm so sorry," the dark haired woman was saying, hands fluttering a little helplessly.

"It's okay," the blonde said with a dismissive wave, but her dark haired companion was shaking her head.

"It's not okay, Christy. I basically ruined one of your shirts. At least let me grab you some napkins to dry off."

"As long as you never call me that again," the blonde said wryly. The dark haired woman just grinned before hurrying off into the ice cream shop.

Alex rose, eyes fixed on the blonde. Behind him, Jack said his name, but he ignored it. The blonde woman was pretty in an imposing sort of way, but that wasn't why Alex was staring. "You're that woman!" he said, struck dumb by the sudden realization washing over him. "The one in the picture Ian kept in his wallet between the photo of Mum and Dad and all my school photos." He pushed down the little pang of hurt that talking about Ian in past tense caused him, focusing on the way the blonde studied him intently. She looked almost exactly the same as she did in the photo, with pale blonde hair done up in a neat bun and sharp, serious blue eyes.

"He keeps all your school pictures?" Her lips were quirked up in the corners. It wasn't quite a smile, but it was close.

"Yeah, he was a weirdo, but that's not the point," Alex insisted, ignoring the sound of Jack stifling her laughter behind him. "Why did he have a picture of you?"

"Ian and I were engaged once," she said.

"But you weren't when he died?"

"No."

"Why not?"

Jack sucked in a sharp breath, probably ready to tell him how rude he was being, but the woman smiled fondly at him and said, "It was just never the right time. You'll find out when you get older that sometimes you meet the right person at the wrong time and it just doesn't work out. Your uncle and I were good friends though."

"He would've hated hearing you call him my uncle." Alex's smile wobbled a little bit, but it was a real one.

Her smile widened, just a little. "I know."

"How come I've never met you before?" Alex hadn't met any of Ian's work colleges before. Even when Ian had been alive, he'd thought that was a little weird.

The blonde's expression saddened, just a little. "He thought that by keeping you away from us, he would be keeping you safe."

"By lying to me?" Alex's voice was sharp and skeptical. His rage at Ian's lies mixed with his fury over finding out the truth about Yasha the way he had and spilled over.

"Sometimes we lie to people we care about to protect them." Alex opened his mouth to protest and she gently lifted a hand to cover it. "I'm not saying it's right," she told him. "What I'm saying is that sometimes we do dumb things in an attempt to keep what we care about most, safe." The bell over the door at the ice cream shop jingled and they both turned to see the dark haired woman came out carrying a thick bundle of napkins in both hands. "It was nice to talk to you, Alex," the blonde said, turning to head towards her companion.

"Wait," Alex cried, his voice rising in a desperate cry as he watched a new link to Ian walk away. The blonde paused, swiveling back to face him.

"Yes?"

"What's your name? Will I ever see you again?"

"My name is Christina," she said, the corners of her lips quirking up into that almost smile again. "And I think so." Then she turned and clicked away to take the napkins from her dark haired friend. Alex watched her go, mind turning the conversation they'd just had around and around in his head. _Sometimes we do dumb things in an attempt to keep what we care about most, safe._ Maybe it was time to have that conversation with Yasha that he'd been avoiding.

* * *

Alex had been distant since Alan Blunt's ill advised pick-up of the boy at his school. It was something that Yassen had intended to handle before MI6's second attempt to take custody had popped up. They were getting soundly beaten, but were dragging out the court case for as long as possible. Alex had been using that to his advantage. According to Jack, the boy had been basically taking food up to his room and shutting himself in after he got home from school. Yassen could have confronted the boy there, but even with his lingering uncertainty of how to handle Hunter's son, he did have the sense that ignoring Alex's closed door would be a bad idea. He'd let the situation lie, much as it frustrated him to do so, until Jack had, out of the blue, announced that she was going to take Alex to get ice cream after school and that they'd probably be back around the same time he was. Yassen had taken the hint and, after the day of pointless court proceedings had wrapped up, he'd headed directly back to the Chelsea house.

Jack's vehicle was already in the drive when Yassen arrived. He expected Alex to already be holed up in his room, but instead he found the boy sitting on the couch cradling a cup of tea. "We should talk," the boy said, expression serious. Yassen nodded once and then took a seat in one of the arm chairs. Alex stared intently at him for a moment before saying, "Yasha Petrov isn't your real name, is it?"

Yassen hid his amusement at that statement. He'd been born as Yasha, though Petrov was not the correct last name to go with it, but in the end it was just another identity he'd discarded long ago. "No," he confirmed for the boy. "It is not."

Alex nodded once the motion jerky. His fingers were pale where they clenched tight around his tea cup. Yassen waited, patient, for what was to come. He had suspected this would be the outcome after the boy's unexpected second encounter with Blunt. Alex had practically bolted for his room when he'd arrived home that afternoon, slamming and locking his bedroom door behind him. That, coupled with the avoidance, had been enough for Yassen to make a solid guess as to what card the head of MI6 had played. After several long minutes, Alex looked up from his tea and said softly, "You're Yassen Gregorovitch."

"Yes," Yassen confirmed calmly. Alex was tense, but he didn't look away or try to bolt, which made him braver than most grown men.

"What are you doing here?"

"I knew your father," Yassen replied. "He taught me much, and saved my life. Your uncle knew about this. He tracked me down and asked me to protect you if something were to happen to him."

Alex studied him intently, searching for any sign of a lie. "My father was an assassin?" he asked at last.

"Yes," Yassen said. "And no. Your father worked for MI6. He infiltrated the organization I was belonged to as an assassin, and his efforts cost them much." Yassen hesitated for a moment, unsure if what he was about to say next was appropriate for their discussion, but that he would have wanted to know the full truth if it was him. "His success cost your parents their lives. There was a mole and, on the day of their departure under new identities, their plane was blown up." Alex nodded, looking as if he were simply absorbing an interesting history lesson. Yassen doubted that the boy understood how to detach himself emotionally from a situation. It was likely the fact that he did not remember his parents which spared him more than a bit of fleeting pain at hearing about their betrayal and death.

"So you're here because of my dad," Alex summarized, placing the tea cup down on the coffee table.

"And because your uncle was incredibly determined to ensure your safety," Yassen confirmed, thinking of the knock on his hotel room door that had signaled Ian Rider's unexpected arrival all those years ago.

"Okay." Alex nodded once, as if something had been decided, and then asked, "So what do I call you?"

"Continuing to call me Yasha would be best for now." If Ian Rider was indeed alive, as Yassen suspected, then they could handle the matter of what Alex would call him from there, and whether the boy would have any further contact with an internationally wanted assassin. For now though, with MI6 watching their every move, it would be best not to give them any evidence that Yasha Petrov and Yassen Gregorovitch were one and the same.

"Okay," Alex said again. "Good talk. I have homework to do." Then the boy hurried out of the room, just barely managing not to run. Yassen watched him go in silent bemusement. The teenager was a mystery, and only time would tell whether telling Alex the truth had been the right thing to do or not.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's the first update of 2021! In all seriousness, Yassen and Alex really did not want to have any kind of conversation, so this chapter was a bit of a struggle. Hopefully it turned out all right! Happy reading, and I'll see you all next chapter!


End file.
